Honey and Apple Glazed Top Sirloin.....in the snow/rain

Like a lot of hard core grillers, I use my grill all year round. Today was one of those days when most people wouldn't even think about grilling. It was raining when I light the charcoal, but when I came back out to put the cooking grate on it was snowing. It helps that I have a covered porch so I shouldn't be bragging, plus I wouldn't want to get my performer wet if it wasn't (its my baby). The snow shovel was on stand and my pal is looking for dropped food, not so lucky Paris I am a whiz with the tongs. I think I should tell my landlord the mailbox needs a coat of paint.

Steak was on the menu, Adam Perry Lang style. As per usual he builds the flavour by having a moist rub(soy sauce, worchestershire sauce, chili powder) then a dry rub(chili powder, garlic, salt, pepper, lemon pepper) before the meat even hits the grill. Then the meat is grilled and has a glazed applied at the end composed of apple juice, apple cider, honey, garlic, pepper flakes and butter. I used to be a strickly salt and pepper guy on my steak, but man is this technique is flavourful.

Then to build even more flavour you paint the cutting board. What this means is you put a flavour profile on the cutting board, typically, EVOO, salt pepper, an herb, and lemon zest. Then while you cut the meat you dredge it in the sauce on the cutting board.

Had dinner ready just in time to watch hockey, I think the leafs were down by 3-0 by this point though. And no I don't have a flat screen yet, I am waiting till they give them out for free.

German Deli Style Top Tound, AKA Gross Beef.

I am beginning to see that Adam Perry Lang really is the King of BBQ. I smoked a eye of the round on Sunday following a Serious BBQ recipe called German Style Top round. It wasn't like the dried out roast beef you may remember having as a kid.

It was smoked with one chunk of hickory at 250 degrees F till it hit a temperature of 115 then, the temperature was cranked to 350F until the meat reached an internal temperature of 135F.

It was then wrapped in Saran wrap with minced garilic and time to rest to about room temp and then sliced as thinly as possible.

As suggested by APL it was served on rye with with Russian dressing, and with a spinach salad and some sweet potato mash. Come get some!

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Smoking a Rainbow

I probably have fish at least once a week. Typically pan fried, sometimes with a dusting of flour and sometimes with out. It is an easy and fast week day meal. Grilling fish can sometimes be a bit of a pain depending on the type, particularly with it falling apart when it is flipped. That is okay as long as you are having fish tacos or you don't care about the presentation. You can't beat planked salmon when it comes to grilling fish. It doesn't have to be flipped, generally fast and easy with little need to tend to it while it cooks. But I have been buying Rainbow Trout a lot more and I don't want to pay 3 bucks for a cedar plank every time I want a good piece of grilled and smoked flavored fish. So I think I'll start experimenting. The other night I put together a glaze containing honey, lemon juice, Dill, EVOO, shallot, garlic and a BBQ rub and rubed it on a piece of trout. I then set up the performer for indirect cooking at 250 with some apple wood chips and smoked the trout for 40 minutes or so. It tasted great, I didn't have to baby sit the bbq while it was smoking so I could do other things while waiting for dinner like tiring out my hyper dog. I think I have to be careful with a delicate meat such as fish with the smoke concentration for future smoking because I am sure it could get overwhelmed with smoke if you aren't careful. Apple wood works good and the fish turned out great but I think I will get my hands on some Alder chips for next time and give that a go, as it provides a lighter smoke flavour.

Eat Me....I am a Perogie!

Probably my one of my favourite things to eat are perogies. I have it occasionally as a meal in it self with fried onions, bacon, green onion, sour cream and cheddar cheese on top. It is also my go to meal to bring to festivus with the boys. However I always buy them and have never made them. Jenn found a perogie recipe in Canadian living so we decided to make them while she was visiting me in scenic Windsor Ontario. We made two fillings, a sweet potato and a cheddar potato. The dough was just basically flour, oil, salt and egg, pretty simple and turned out great.

A standard pint water glass makes the perfect sized circle for perogies.

Lady fingers fold better perogies than stumpy man fingers, I had the dough all over the outside when trying to roll them up. PS gotta love living in a student apartment with lots of counter space.

They turned out great, the cheddar potato were probably the favourite.  The dough recipe was

• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 3/4 cup water
• 1 egg
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 tbs canola oil

Super Sunday

The great thing about football is it gives you an excuse to drink on sundays.......especially if it is Super Sunday. I spent this Super Sunday watching the game by myself(isn't that sad), working till 2:30 then running home to get some ribs on the grill so they would be ready for kickoff. I followed an APL(Adam Perry Lang) recipe and put a little cinnamon in the rub. I don't know if I noticed the cinnamon but the ribs were dynamite. I wrapped the ribs after they smoked for 2 hours. This is something I don't typically do but I think I might have to start because they turned out tender and moist. I had some coleslaw and baked beans with them as well. Beans were an APL recipe as well. They were delish but I think I might have to watch the sugar ingredients for next time because sometimes I find his recipes a little sweet for my taste buds.

Food rolled up

The first time I had Sushi was only 3 years ago. Now I love it and could eat it every week, except going out for it means spending at least $60 or more depending if it is all you can eat, and I typically leave still hungry. Hopefully once Jenn graduates from Physiotherapy school and I become Mr. Mom we will be able to go out for it more often. Until then occasionally I become Masaharu Morimoto and make it .
My parents got me a sushi cook book for christmas and it gives a good description on how to make proper sushi rice. It essentially requires you to boil equal parts of water and rice for about 10 minutes then letting it sit for an additional 20 minute. Then you take the rice out of the pot and place it in a big bowl and pour a mixture of rice vinegar, sugar and salt over the rice while fanning it so the mixture coats the rice but doesn't make it too mushy. This is a very important step because unseasoned rice means the sushi will taste pretty bland.

We made some California rolls (avacado, cucumber, crab) and philly rolls (cream cheese, green onion, smoked salmon) the first time. We also made what I call a dragon roll (California with avocado on the outside) and salmon sushi. Nori is the paper like black sheets that wrap up the ingredients allowing the sushi to be rolled up. Putting the Nori on the outside allowed us to make the sushi pretty easily. Mise en place is very important once you are ready to start rolling.

I think the output turned out pretty good. It all tasted great but their is still lots of room for improvement. For comparison is a photo of Jen and mines favourite sushi place large boat sushi platter.

Yeah their is tones of room for improvement looking at this picture.

Apple Smoked Mac and Cheese

I like mac and cheese but I am not one to rave about it. After I made this recipe I think I will be making mac and cheese more often. I watch the Food Network more than the average person, so I often pick up ideas from some of the shows. Road Grill is a pretty good show but I find Matt Dunigan annoying at times when he is describing ingredients......."oooooooohhhh look at this chili powder" he is just way to over the top at the dumbest ingredients. However after trying his smoked mac and cheese I now like him both for his football and food knowledge. It is basically cooked macaroni, layered with tomato, bacon, onion and cheddar cheese, smoked with apple wood for about 1 hr. Could be done on weekdays for a meal or on the weekend for a side.